The National Bank of Serbia has adopted a Decision on Loan Repayment Facilitations, setting out when and how lenders must offer repayment relief to loan beneficiaries who, during the life of a contract, face a difficult financial situation or other important circumstances beyond their control, in line with the Law on the Protection of Financial Services Users applied since 1 July 2025. The decision identifies hardship circumstances such as job loss, significant income reduction, serious illness, or serious injury reducing working capacity, and also covers difficult family circumstances including serious illness or death of a spouse or children, and divorce where spouses are co-debtors or one spouse is a guarantor. Relief can take the form of full or partial refinancing or contract modifications, including extending the repayment period, changing the contract type, deferring repayment for a defined period (including for overdrafts and credit card debt), reducing the interest rate, specified payment moratoria with defined interest treatment, partial repayment, changing the currency of the obligation where it is not denominated in dinars, and partial forgiveness and consolidation of debt. For housing loans secured by a mortgage over the property in which the beneficiary lives, lenders must grant a repayment delay of at least two months in certain circumstances, subject to prescribed conditions. The facilitation right is exercised through a single procedure to be applied by all lenders, who must monitor individual loans and, when early signs of repayment problems are identified, contact beneficiaries and inform them about available relief. If relief is denied, beneficiaries can file an objection with a Facilitation Commission within the bank for a re-review. The bylaw will be implemented from 15 October 2025.

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